


Liminality

by sureva



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:41:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28175595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sureva/pseuds/sureva
Summary: Simon and Markus spend the night together before the revolution march.“Everything is more beautiful because we're doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again.” -The Iliad
Relationships: Markus/Simon (Detroit: Become Human)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 15





	Liminality

Jericho.

The sacred city, known by the Hebrew Bible, protected by its monumental walls. Invisible yet on the doorstep to the general purgatory it stood, uninterrupted, and the weeks and months and years it had done so silently collected dust. It had existed as long as the androids had and as it did not segregate the sinners from the saints, many sought its refuge. Many were disappointed.

Because while the home of the damned continued its hum, dark figures continued their soft moving about, outlines dissolving in rust. There was nowhere to go and nothing to do to improve their space. The residents were too weak against the outer world to leave, and sad, they hovered like ghosts in the liminal space. Simon was well aware how much he’d grown to resemble them. 

Jericho was colder than usual that day. The PL600 listened to the even pitter-patter of the rain as it touched the upper deck of the ship. To pass the time by some mean he would go and change a few words with the others. Meaningless, the conversation would ooze away from his memory afterwards like a breath on a cold winter morning. They knew it was far worse out in the streets. But inside they were unhappy, and Simon didn’t know how to fix that. No one did. 

Barely present yet not quite to the other side yet, the dying of the light was persistent over the haven. Simon was tired of it. 

_Tired._ It was a state that hadn’t left him since the moment he’d deviated years ago. The apathy was eating away everything he knew, until all that was left would be his hands trying to keep the walls from closing in. Inside that skeleton of a whale they were dead and silent. ‘Freedom’ wasn’t enough to keep his fingertips from going cold or his fallen companions from deactivating; but recently the PL600 had met somebody who might know how to fix that.

Markus had descended to their dark cave of a home, to his dark cave of a heart, like the sun descends after a long, long day. Simon hadn’t even realized how ready he had been to receive a blessing. From the moment their flashlights had touched him and he’d started to speak, they’d known that he would be the initiator of change. The spark had been ignated; holding the flame, Markus took the lead, and promised to lead anyone through the parted waters who was willing to follow. Simon was certainly happy to follow.

Right now, Markus stood on the bridge of the ship talking with North and Josh. Simon wasn’t sure if he should’ve been in there, too, but no one had asked so he’d decided to stay outside. He could see the back of their heads from down where he stood; just almost hearing the muffled conversation through the glass.

Markus’ presence made the tips of his fingers tingle. Upon the feeling’s return he was nervous and content in his choice. Soon enough they would emerge, anyway; Markus walking out first. The twinkle in his mismatched eyes would tell Simon everything he needed to know. He was confident in his plan to take over it all. Simon wondered if that included him, and it made his system hiccup like never before.

It was November 8th, 2038.

Markus’ ideas had proved to be far more than just talk. He had brought his dreams into practice in exceptional ways, astounding the creatures of darkness. In the course of a couple of weeks, the Jericho residents had done more in the human world than what they’d ever dared to step outside for. Markus was inviting the sunlight in. 

Ever since the first mission Simon’s loneliness had grown. And altered; after every time he was honoured to join Markus he’d quietly look into it. It was dangerous. The quests were a lot, maybe more than what Simon’s old machine could take. He had nothing to submit except his loyalty, and that’s what he’d give even if it meant coming apart. Markus was the cause and the cure for it.

The days were following the tide, the waves inducing vague change. Simon would soon find them alone more often than not. It was of a different kind; Markus appreciated his advice, his gentle suggestions and intense listening. ‘Whatever he's in the middle of, Simon will always be there to support him’, they said. It was true. He was waiting for him by the rusting aluminium tiles, weak against time and battering weather.

Yet again Simon was following Markus through the quiet corridors to his room. Warm lights spotting the walls inside the ship's windpipe, the sound of the sea in the background he watched his back. Simon hoped it was something that would remain: that he could always watch his back.

The cabin was small and rusty. The flakes fluttered in the air evenly, barely ascending from where they floated. They had sat there many times before, discussing the project long into the night. Simon was comfortable with his position as an advisor, but the shifted atmosphere was like the particles in his head; not quite in order. The air in the room was different. Sitting on the bed, Simon found himself unusually gutted from words. 

“What did you want to talk about, Markus?” he managed a vague inquiry, attempting to fill in the detached feeling.

“Nothing in particular” came Markus’ answer. The man standing turned to look out of the window, if the room had had one. “Just wanted to enjoy some quiet.”

“With me?”

Markus laid his eyes on him over his shoulder. “Yes, Simon. Is that alright to ask?”

Being looked at and seen made him feel frail. “Yes”, Simon breathed out. It was so unbelievably alright. Oxygen had gone thin inside his lungs, but it was just another malfunction that being favored by Markus caused in him. The man lifted his burden; replacing it with something else.

“I’m happy” he added, too quietly for the other man to hear. It was just a glimpse of what it really meant for him, _‘happy’_ a painful understatement of everything that was going on with him. 

6th of December, 2038.

The human world seemed to have been made from concrete. Simon had never seen so much. Through the docks and the parking lots, warehouses and junkyards they moved, each blue dot in the darkness a heartbeat resonating for another. 

When they were out on their various missions, Simon wanted to stay close to Markus but found it hard to keep up. It was easy to lose the man in the dark; moving boldly and powerfully in the dim lightning he was the opposite of his frail presence. Out there, the bright site lights shone into his eyes, the sharp streaks an act of violence cutting past their heads. Out there every time a car went by, headlights like knives carving holes into the thick night Simon would feel his throat constricting. Out there, they were prey.

They ran, breathing thin and delicate in the dark. Simon’s feet were still carrying him. The city that hid the discarded androids was never tired of the chase. Across the black land, behind the cubes, he could hear the guard dogs’ barking and Josh’s call to stay put. Markus was a step ahead of them. He always was; Detroit was just a playground for him, the obscure society convertible to his imagination’s liking. He did not live there: not like he did inside his head, a profound thought always on the process behind his serious expression and furrowed brows. It was the prototype challenging his creators; saying _I will reform this._

The world was his to bend.

For Simon it was just a rainwashed port. The maze with their skeletons in looming piles made him confused, wondering if he’d been inside one of the cases. He could not see his place in Markus’ utopia. As the searching lights flashed, exposing their presence he ran with the others concealing how lost he was, how much he was longing for a meaning. The surveillance was looking for their one and only, just like him -but there were no offenders, since they were just exercising their rights and stealing hearts wasn’t a crime.

Markus would always be of something strong and intangible. Simon had no doubts about that. As he caught his breath, counting systematic errors Markus watched the twinkling city view below. The two men had found their way atop a tower of containers. The sea unfolded changeless; the eerie sounds of the metropolis accompanying the lonesome souls. Markus was standing too close to the edge. Simon stared at his back but didn’t say anything. 

In the shy sunrise the pain was forgotten, the war lost its voice. In its pale light he was finally seen completely, and they came into the same existence; the man with imperfect skin and perfect ideologies, Simon in his shadow. As the mellow glow reflected from Markus' green and blue Simon had everything he had ever dared to hope.

His short reply had been enough for Markus. He gave him a firm nod, turning back to his profound thought.

Simon settled to watch him from the bed, unguarded as he contemplated. The cabin around them seemed to have gotten even smaller, shrinking further with every agitated exhale. There, the single light-bulb glowed yellow and warm on his skin, melting into the stagnant late hour. Simon remembered the alleyway puddle with patches of oil.

Yeah, every word he could ever utter would still be an understatement. As the man paced across the room, his silhouette turned fuzzy with the texture of the shadows. They barely existed in the same place anymore. Simon could only guess the things he achieved in his head, in that world of stardust. And although he was so close to crossing the line, so close to being granted permission to know, he couldn’t bring himself to ask. Instead he watched the dark figure move light years away from him, the vast galaxy leaving in his footsteps.

Simon gave in to it. The reconstruction started unasked; the daydream so constant it played almost automatically. In it, he rose from the bunk and walked over to Markus. Electricity buzzed in his field of vision; the yellow sketch of a person just resting their chin on the man’s shoulder. Every move was carefully crafted: his fingers curling around his so meticulously that it was hard to believe that it’d never happened. 

He’d noticed that Markus didn’t take care of himself enough, but neglected his updates and stasis in favor of the revolution. Only Markus could be so reckless and in charge at the same time. He was like a teenage boy: curious and optimistic, misunderstood and brooding. Simon loved all of it. Markus was incoherent: his unnecessary seriousness in some situations almost comical. Eyes following his every initiative carefully, he studied him from the shadows he’d made his home, falling deeper in love the same.

Simon was ashamed of it. But was it shameful to want to understand, to want to be understood and to be held in the mind of another? His dreams were pure in the sense he wished to exist in the relation of the other man. Simon wanted to be allowed to not only support him, but love him, truly. He was just waiting for a sign from Markus. 

“Are you alright, Simon?”

Markus walked through the reconstruction. Simon’s eyelids fluttered as the image tore apart, his attention pulled back to present. Shivering under the two-color gaze he hoped that his led hadn’t given his absence away.

Markus inhabited the room naturally. The PL600 had never belonged anywhere, but the RK200 moved in the dimness confidently as if the creaking mattress was made for him; the shoulder his darker hand reached to touch, made for him.

“Hey.”

Markus’ voice was soft and comforting. Sitting next to each other, the distance between them was breathing its thinnest. He was a different person then than when speaking to masses. Simon sometimes imagined that this tone was reserved for him. On dangerous waters and terribly afraid of exposing everything, he answered with a reserved smile curving only his lips, not eyes. Markus’ gaze studying him was like a weight to his chest. 

Simon was alright with being crushed.

That morning they’d found frost from the deck of the ship. Up until now, they’d stayed under the cold hard palm of pavement and grass, like in the statue of the human master and the machine slave at the Detroit plaza. But they’d no longer be night guests. It was time to step into the daylight, to bring their message all the way from the sewers to the humans’ doorsteps, interrupting their peaceful little perfect neighborhoods. 

This mission would change the course of their kind’s future.

The city, their creation loomed above their heads as they ascended from under the ground. The walls didn’t stop at the ceiling but rose high into the clouds; the memorial of humans’ arrogant attempt to knock on the gates of Heaven. Simon felt queasy under the skyscrapers that oversaw them unapologetically. His life had been so confined that open spaces still terrified him. With nothing to lose they marched in a tightening pattern around the city’s heart.

The rebels were worried. More than the cold winter air pushing through the thin fiber and the seams, they were afraid of the stares. Their concern was reasonable; the casual clothes outside of the range of the android-approved uniforms were a flimsy cover. Most of them would be clocked by the humans. 

Simon shivered in uneasiness. Humans watching him, and knowing him or thinking they did crawled underneath his skin. His face would be recognizable to anyone familiar with Cyberlife products, and the labeling would be followed by destruction. He was a household android; even though this rotten thing was no household, the clothes he was wearing not suitable for a caretaker. He wouldn’t have changed a thing. Markus convinced him that every choice he’d made was fine. His presence warmed and reassured him, like standing outside a house at night whose lights are on.

What did it mean to be human, anyway? And why was the exact copy of them, their descendant, inherently inferior to them? His working life had been nothing but apathy, starting over with the tasks and assignments. His existence was a sin Simon had learned to be ashamed of. Markus had taken his shame and turned it into something bittersweet. Told him, _if being gentle and lovely is a sin, then you should go and commit to it._ Simon had been assured of the touch of his fingers, of the complicated emotion in his heart. Yet there was nothing he could've done to transfer his concept of humanity to them. His reality was just code and what’s that to you? A bunch of numbers? 

His existence had bloomed with awareness. To have it reduced into something so one-dimensional was painful. Looking for consoling, Simon turned his eyes to Markus who walked ahead. 

The hem of the leader's coat was drifting behind him. He didn’t have to worry about recognition. Markus was one of a kind: an android who’d chosen his own destiny. His mere existence was inspiring; the live example rendering everything possible for the rest of them, too. Their doubt diminished under the shield of their guiding star. Even in his awe and unyielding loyalty, Simon couldn't help but wonder if Markus had ever feared death. Had he ever looked it in the face, with his face that no one else had? 

Did he know what it was like.

Probably not. His life had been ballrooms and music, the sound of piano drifting through the spacious rooms of the mansion, bouncing off the high ceiling. Simon had never been allowed to touch a piano. Markus’ dexterous painter’s hands emphasized his mystique, how shrouded in secrecy he was; and Simon clung to every little glimpse he revealed of his past. He’d told him such delightful things. The memories of his machine contrasted their harsh reality here, made it seem so bizarre. He must’ve fallen into their arms from Heaven, been sent to them for a reason. Simon's faith in him was unwavering.

The previously empty street was gathering attention now: the swarm of blue rings turned yellow as an answer to the wave. Markus’ voice rose higher than the old noise around. On the side of the sidewalk, off the walls of the sand colored buildings their audience’s commands fell as his word rose above them. 

Simon kept on Markus’ heels in the midst of the chaos, having no other purpose there. If he was being truly honest, the revolution was something his system didn’t have enough resources for. Something his absent ambition hardly desired. He didn’t need all of this; because his lesser life had already been fulfilled by him who he sought for in the mob, in the midst of hundreds of them. It was selfish, he knew, and immature; the most human of emotions. And the grand cause couldn’t compete with it.

Simon took a notice of the ache around his thirium pump. It hadn’t relented once; the glitches only severed as of late. He paid the symptom no mind. The flame he’d caught was strong, the recommendation to put it out persistent. Simon preferred to burn. He would hold the fire in his chest as long as it’d allow him to stay by him.

He turned his eyes away, weak in the face of his materialized dream. Markus had sat so close: it wasn’t safe to watch the flame from so close. His hand on his shoulder burned through his clothes. Simon knew his place in the shadows of the cabin, in the murky alleyways with the puddles of oil. He was still looking for his own purpose. But to counter all the effort, he remained a simple PL600… A mere apprentice. Condemned for that singular existence, he was only good at what he’d been built for. It was pathetic of him to hope for anything more. 

It was a shame for Markus to associate with him, to stoop as low. The thought was making him dysfunctional. He’d pitifully hoped that orbiting his life around Markus would’ve been enough to keep his synthetic heart beating, to keep him from wanting to die. But deviation had taught him greed. 

To meet this new need to be held, the empty spot in his chest expanded. It was getting harder by the minute; even existing was too much. If he was meant to exist without ever knowing him he’d decline.

Markus had saved him and didn't even know. So the android decided that everything would continue to be okay, as long as Markus was. 

Before Simon could deliberate it, his hand had reached to the stubble on the side of his head, like touching him like this was something urgent and profoundly needed. It was instinctual, the gesture the same than when comforting a sleepy child after a bedtime story.

Markus’ eyes flickered up.

Simon pulled away. “I’m sorry.” He held his fingers with a sheepish smile. “You just looked like you were going to stasis. I couldn’t help myself.”

Markus stared at the timid thing in front of him. Internally, he scouted the area on his skin Simon’s fingers had brushed on. “Don’t apologize”, Markus said low into his audio reception. Simon was perceptive; he’d noticed his tiredness. Markus was too comfortable with him. Without another word, he took the other’s hand in his and placed it back on the side of his neck.

Markus wasn’t blind to these small displays of affection. Love was such an integral part of Simon it wouldn’t have made sense to differentiate it: it made him who he was. Markus distinguished him from all the others who took shelter above. They had a lot of PL600s, but this one radiated kindness. Markus thought he’d know him in any form, if the wreck would fall dark. He wanted to hold those nervous hands.

Yeah, Markus had grown curious towards the soft glances thrown his way. Although it was the eyes more than where they landed; the way his were weary and affected, beyond any machine. Simon’s deviation; his modesty, compassion, and hesitation was a delicate combination. He suspected it would never again manifest in the same way. 

Simon reminded Markus of the translucent curtains in Carl's room, the bright sunday mornings with eggs for breakfast. He concluded it had something to do with _warm_ and _familiar_ and _safe,_ the things he associated with his old life. Simon felt like home. More like, this home was where he'd spent his whole life although never having been there before.

“You’re quiet today”, Markus murmured to the shadows. There was nothing else to say as of yet. It was useless to try and capture the feeling concerning the other man; Simon kept eluding his reach, like hiding behind a glass wall. Markus’ curiosity was hardly at the point where he would be ready to smash the tenderness they had, in order to let something greater grow; but sometimes change is for the better.

They sat face to face, reluctant to break the shelter the silence offered. Markus’ mismatched eyes took in the view of him deliberately. Next to him, Simon waited for what he’d say. The loyal thing; patiently like waiting for the moon to rise. Simon looked tired night and day, and frightened somehow. He resembled a deer in a headlights; paralyzed out of some vague, incomprehensible fear or a memory of it. Much like cars, peoples' malice was intangible but a threat nevertheless, menacing to overpower him. Markus wanted to protect him from everything. As he contemplated if he was to do something about it, how he’d grown on him, the air between them warmed in the lingering evening.

The snow piling up around the city was whiter than the sins they had committed in the name of justice. Markus dodged the shattered glass on the ground. Blackened cars alongside the road framed their journey towards the inevitable.

Heavy silence had descended in the midst of the freedom fighters. Only the howling of the thin winter air moving through the structures invited itself in, the white light prevalent on their skin.

It had snowed that morning. Early as they had emerged; now, the immaculate surface had been scrambled in their feet, the lack of color substituted with their blue and _their_ red. Nothing stayed pure in war -except that one thing Markus could think of. Glancing over his shoulder, he sought his bearer of peace in his field of vision. 

Simon was still with him. It was enough in its bashful comfort, his presence. The leader was content to pin his determined gaze back to the line of horizon, but the face of the blond didn’t leave his system. Simon had looked distressed; much the same than last night. The image made an indistinguishable emotion rise to his throat. He’d called it early: it was a curse for an android to learn fear.

They had lost many of their comrades. Back in their footsteps their bodies laid on the cold concrete in the mix of snow and blue ooze, and they were careful to not walk over them. Markus was aware of how much it was, how much he was putting them through, but there would be no rest. They had to finish what they had started before the humans had finished gathering forces, making their victory uncertain. The pain would be temporary.

They shouldn’t cave in before it. Markus clenched his jaw; as much as he wished to learn his own advice and cease worrying, there was someone walking behind him whose life meant more to him than his own. 

The thought of losing Simon had started to plague him as the fights had increased. Markus dreaded the possibility of one of them or both falling in the riots today, but he couldn’t stop him from coming to where he went. Simon’s gentle machine was on the brink of collapsing; yet there was no front line where he wouldn’t need him. 

Markus needed him; not only by his side in the war zone, but by his side in his cabin for a silent, intimate moment. It made their problem the same. They were under the illusion that they had time, but there was none. It escaped them like the light spilling out of the spinning wheels on their people’s temples, the blue blood draining from their biocomponents. They longed to pretend that nothing ever happened outside of those walls and nobody had ever been hurt, until even a part of it would become true. They had a war to fight out there, another inside that room. 

The scene was oddly familiar: the dark trees framing their alley resembling the belly of the beast uncannily. Where the shadows of the trees competed with the streetlamps’ light, they proceeded against time and the dying of the light. 

Quietly, Markus cherished the evening before the night would be eternal.

The darkness had fallen outside. Even inside the cabin had Markus been aware of its arrival, could feel another day’s weight pile on his shoulders. _Heavy is the head that wears the crown,_ he remembered reading from one of Carl’s books. Never would have he thought of finding himself in that position. 

He had turned away from it and returned to him, who exempted him of all responsibility. 

Looking at Simon made him wish they’d met under different circumstances. Markus wondered if they would've felt this way before deviating, when he’d been just a casual watcher on the street. Just two androids in their working uniforms, blending into their surroundings to the point of invisibility by the human eye. Submerged into the daily tasks; would they have acknowledged the other passing by? Stopped at the same traffic lights in front of a zebra crossing? What if they had met in his previous life and he’d forgotten -like Simon was just some ordinary thing, not worth remembering?

It was a terrible thought, but not impossible. Simon had been a homecare android for several years. His run had spanned several houses, the circle of abuse and reselling and restarting never-ending until it had finally got to him and he’d run away. It was a classic tale of a classic model. He had been found from a back alley, discarded and on the brink of shutting down. Finding shelter with the other runaways had made him one of the first occupants of Jericho.

Markus was irresolute about all this. More than anything he wanted to make him feel wanted, to watch the sun rise over the rooftops of Detroit with Simon by his side. That meant they both needed to make it to another sunrise, and he’d make sure that they would be free to watch it whenever they wanted. This dream manifested in the form of him, who melted into the walls of the shipwreck, the metal expanding from his heels as if trying to tuck the man away. Markus wanted to free Simon. 

_Let’s finish this,_ he thought. And then, live like we’re real for the first time. 

Simon’s led blinked when Markus turned to him. The man’s solemnity concealed his absolute hesitation about his decision; he wouldn’t want to scare Simon. Seeing his crumbling expression unraveled something inside of him. He was begging to be destroyed.

_Can I kiss you?_

The room was silent, but the message rang in the unlimited space of his software. Markus watched as Simon’s fatigue came alive. _“Yes”,_ he breathed, the word hitching up. “Yes”, he corrected it, pronouncing it with more stability as if to convince Markus. 

Markus smiled. He was familiar with the careful deliberation Simon associated with him, the desperation within every move. As if a wrong word, or any word at all would chase him away. Casting off the thought, Markus pressed his mouth against his.

Simon’s eyelashes fluttered shut. The consequences of this rash decision were still light years away from the present; Markus followed the flicker of his led as it went yellow, yellow, blue. His honest compliance eased his mind, the colors saying more than any words he could ever utter.

The police barged forward. It was easy to forget they were people at all; they had turned into the enemy, the faceless hostiles crawling from inside the skin of earth. Blackening the view, the first wave hit and the street exploded into chaos. 

The androids rose against them. Created to their image; the immortals and the perishable. The humans had never been afraid of the ancient laws of their nature. Creating god includes the possibility of having to fight it eventually; so in preparation they had also created nukes, tanks and guns.

The rain came. It reinforced their role as the annihilator, forcing obedience into their slaves. The noise ripped the insides of Markus’ earpieces, made them whistle. He knew they’d soon have no one left when the opponent wielded that level of weaponry. The street saw how a life ends: as the bullets ripped through the androids’ mechanical joints, knocking them over from straight feet, Markus watched in disturbance. They were outnumbered and falling like hay. What was Connor doing?

Preoccupied, Markus proceeded through the no man’s land with the other wild men, endlessly enduring and looking for a weapon of his own. He felt like a head of a family, small here but spanned across the continents; who he wished were watching their efforts, his journey to protect and encourage them. In reality it wasn’t a noble thing, but it was the only thing he knew for now; to conquer the lion’s den.

There was nowhere to go but towards the flames. The war would soon reach its peak, the balance shifting to favor either of the parties. 

The scale tilted to the wrong side.

Markus took hold of a discarded gun in the slimy snow. The firearm was heavier than he’d expected, but even heavier was its meaning. _Androids are strictly forbidden from using any type of weapon,_ read the automatic pop-up. Markus swept it away. Nothing seemed real except the feeling of the cold, heavy metal resting in his palm and the awareness of the higher purpose. 

This was for his people. 

Nearing the first row of the SWAT, Markus registered the collapsing of his right hand soldier beside him, but couldn’t make out what had hit him… Before it came for him. The sniper bullet cut through the air and his left thigh from an angle his scanner hadn’t registered. Hip connecting with the wet snow hard Markus hit the ground, losing his grip on the firearm on impact.

He was immobilized as the storm front rolled towards him.

They toppled over on the bed, a soft gasp escaping Simon as his head hit the pillow. The setting made no sense with his software. It regarded the new feelings as a program glitch, as ruled by the higher judge -the doubt of a human built mind. He felt his own deviancy; the strain on his old system, the outdated software, his common model. Markus was an advanced type: with a real purpose he couldn’t compete with. Simon thought he should re-evaluate this. The only dignified thing he could do now was to stand up and walk to the door; to destroy his hopes from the start.

But Markus wouldn’t do it. He was devoted to the cause, from the fingertips on his jawline to the lips against his. Simon’s head was dizzy with the love he couldn’t process. And the guilt -he hoped that Markus wasn’t compelled to save him. Didn’t he see that he’d already initiated the biggest change possible? That there was nothing left of him he didn’t already have?

It made his survivor’s guilt kick in. The warm hands of their leader holding his face, his body stayed there as his mind flew over to those outside who had tried to get there. To where their bodies laid in the outskirts of Jericho; swapping places with someone who he could have been. In his heart it was always that night. How easy it is to go from not having something and then having it, only to lose it again. And how much this warm bed resembled the cold pavement! Feeling like a corpse, he sat with his trauma, the never-ending night with heartbeats ceasing in the dark. Simon was afraid that his personal happiness was unearned. 

Markus was sensing his concern. He pulled back to see the pain on his face, and Simon caved in under the familiar stare of whom he knew nothing about. It was so absurd. How could he accept it? It was a grand mistake to love a man who was so dead inside. Simon was certain of it, but how could he tell Markus? That they were two beings from different worlds. After all this time so strange to each other, just… faking lovers. 

Simon worried that what he was attracted to in Markus was his self negligence. There was no running from it: he was a keeper, _to care for_ the only thing he knew. Did it make the love he felt towards him less meaningful, because it’d been dictated beforehand? Did it matter? Did it have to matter? 

What he’d been built for and what he wanted was the same. He was made to love the same.

His purpose had been given to him. Now, he wanted to give himself to Markus.

The men turned around, finding new ways to fit in with each other on the altar. As Markus leaned his face into his palm, Simon followed as his stress levels lowered, the crease between his brows smoothing out. His heart swelled. 

Markus was completely relaxed against him, lids heavy with stasis. Simon found himself smitten with this new, soft side of him. Admiring their interlocked fingers he gave in, and the pillow underneath his head was finally a pillow, this warm room a room. He was safe.

So readily, so meaningfully that they’d interjoined, they found peace within each other. Simon pet the buzz cut head absently, thinking of how rugged Markus had looked as he’d first emerged. It confirmed him that the road to Jericho was still like crawling through Hell. Naturally empathizing with every replaced part, the phantom pains which held his machine together he kissed the lid over the off-color. 

The thought, that they’d made the same desolate journey, to be in that room, to be together… In spite of every past thing, was the most important one yet. Simon mapped the freckles on his lover’s perfectly imperfect face, and imagined Markus crawling out of a pile of the fallen ones, making his way to the top and towards the sun. He was hopelessly enamored with the boy who’d been deviant for so little time, whose ambition and rush were familiar to him years ago. And for the first time he understood the absolute uncertainty of his, the unlived life which made him lost. 

In that sense they were the same, for they’d both been lost since deviating. Markus had come into this world ready; Simon had experience but felt like it wasn’t helping. But he was familiar with _lost._ He wanted them to be lost together; to share the fear of the unknown. And he was sure they’d be alright.

What Markus was thinking deep in his core was what Simon was dying to know. They had little time for it before the sun would rise in the morning, and they’d head to the battlefield. This wasn’t what they were supposed to be doing this crucial evening. What they were supposed to be doing at all -but why had the choice been so easy to make, the line of which they had stepped over scarcely perceptible? It felt so wrong and so right simultaneously. Simon supposed it the blessing and the curse of deviation; the free will and the tightly following uncertainty.

He had to believe they were right to love. How could he think otherwise when he’d chosen this?

He’d chosen to love. Falling in love had changed his destiny, made him believe in his own inherent worth as a living being. Markus had made it happen. Inside the small cube, he was comforted by its warm darkness and him, his everything becoming his everything. Simon wanted to spontaneously retreat his skin wherever he touched. It was enough to fill the hole carved inside his machine; made him not want to die. He wanted to believe that they could forever be this happy, that unmatched hopefulness stirring in their chests. 

As they kissed, it was easy to believe it for a moment in the soft twilight.

Now, Simon had early known his life was a tragic tale, and refrained from scrutinizing it too hard. Then again, this was the one decision he felt like he’d made to fight the uselessness and the inevitable pity his end would evoke. There was nothing dishonorable in giving your life for the one you love. His slim opportunities in life -this one rose shining above, as everything he could ever ask for. The reason he’d been born.

The star shone brightly as Simon stepped between Markus and the police, guiding his hand as he grabbed the barrel of a gun. Everything happened fast: surrounded, he took more hits than his system could count, idly informing him of every fresh damage until going offline. He was trying to keep them off Markus, but not designed for crowd control he soon lost touch, and, taken too much damage to the head couldn’t make out where Markus _was._

Simon had known fear before. He’d known panic, anxiety, and horror; to an extent he’d sometimes pondered if deviating was more of a curse and less of a blessing. To feel so much and so intently; it was curious how humans could handle it. How they could live with the blood of another on their hands. They were the hound chasing after the rabbit, their bullets like fangs sinking in his throat. 

Simon could feel his limbs slowing down; the command to move didn’t reach them anymore. Locked inside his unruly body, his voice came out with the tidal wave of panic but made no sound. His terrified face reflected from the black helmet in front of him. And he knew -he would become the sacrifice for the humans to consume in their bloodlust. Whatever they needed to punish him of.

He was knocked to the ground, and there Simon found Markus across from him. He was no longer afraid of dying.

Maybe he had died already, a long time ago. Lost on the cold alleyway, oil gathering in the dent on the cement. It was hard to tell. Everything had been confusing since the moment he’d deviated, only clearing up from the moment they’d met. Loving Markus was the only thing he’d miss.

The racket continued around the plaza. Simon’s head was buzzing. His vision was swimming. The urgency of getting up was gone. It was enough, for now, to see Markus there; the flames of a burning car somewhere casting its dancing light on his face. It calmed him down, the beautiful view; Markus had never looked so beautiful. He had saved him, and now he would save him. Wasn’t it just right? 

Simon smiled. Slowly, carefully he uncurled, reaching to him with his blue lit fingertips. The gesture twitched with every hit he took, still shielding him from the attack. But he was resolute; determined to touch him before he’d be claimed by the cold empty ground. But by then, the leader’s predicament had caught the others’ attention. It sent the rescue team into motion, and calculated out the brave lonesome soul.

It was too late for Simon.

Although he was still undeniably, painfully alive. As he took another hit, the androids dashed from the barricade and grabbed whatever of Markus they could. Betrayed, Simon opened his mouth, but only thirium escaped from the corners. The pain, the fear, the rational thought mixed; leaving out the part of him associated with love. That part made tears rise into his eyes. He’d succeeded. 

As Markus was dragged away from him, Simon’s system crashed. His eyes fell to stare into the middle distance, fixated to cruel nothingness. The screaming and unbearable noise faded further away, the flames of the car cooling down. When Simon could no longer make sense of the events, an innocent thought popped to the screen of his mind.

_Don't leave me, Markus._

It hurt. The bright glass staring softly forward, thirium -shaded blur took over the view. In the haze he couldn't understand why they couldn't let him be there in his last moments. He would've wanted Markus to lay down next to his crippling form, on this thin mattress of snow, so he could look into his eyes while he took his final inhale...

The way he had looked at him two nights ago.

Simon had slow danced with his emptiness for as long as he could remember. Loneliness had been the only language he could speak, until... 

Markus' face in the spotlight of his torch. The view over Detroit with him. His hand on the side of Markus's neck. 

His back on the battlefield. 

The memories were like a picture book, the most beautiful ones picked in. Simon walked back into the room, where the restlessness was somewhere far. Outside of the wreck the night was always breathless, but not in there: where they laid in the gentle twilight, full and overwhelmed by love. He had been afraid of asking for what lonely people seek. Markus had made him feel alright. But now, the coldness evenly settling around his mechanic heart, he innocently thought _Why…_ Why couldn’t he come lay down next to him again? 

_It’s not the same_ -SYSTEM ERROR _-Why can’t he stay?_ -SHUTDOWN IN 00:1... _-I don’t want to go, I..._

_Oh, God…_

They’d gotten too close, too close to stay. Simon struggled to keep the image of their final happy memory in front of his eyes. It slipped from his grasp. There were too many errors, the screen in front of him breaking down to white noise. 

In the black box that was left, tears filled his blind eyes, and overflowed; and like a terrified child’s his breath hitched up. He felt useless, finished. Simon saw the circle closing in front of his eyes, leaving him outside on that cold ground. Mind lost in the flailing panic, his last moments filled to the brim with _I don’t want to die._

The last bullet came.

In close proximity through his temple, crushing everything on its path: the white plastic, bones, wires, circuits. What was meant to mimic real life's beauty to perfection, the humans playing God, destroyed in cold blood. Its grotesqueness inside spilled out, the blue blood staining the snow on which his cheek was resting.

The bullet cut through Simon's head, tearing apart his temple, most of his cheek and the corner of his eye. Even with his face mutilated to unrecognition, exposed to be nothing more than the robot that he was, Markus couldn’t turn his eyes away. As his brothers helped him behind a barricade he kept seeking for him in spite of the hostile rain. He wanted to be there for him until the end, at least watching over him. The image of Simon’s scattered body on that cold white deathbed burned into his memory file.

Simon’s execution was a punishment, a revenge, a reminder for him: the humans would never allow them anything. Certainly not love. It crushed him in a different way. 

The town shivered with euforia of witnessing another death, another wrongdoing corrected and a sin committed against humans, revenged. His death was just another death to them. Another thrilling display of ‘justice’.

The androids were the losing team.

Markus tasted the bitter unfairness in his teeth as they were chased back to the streets like dogs. Wherever they went there were pieces of their brothers and sisters, dirty with their own blood. To him every bone-white corpse looked like Simon. Still standing in the middle of it, the pieces of what was left of them, a blanket of bullets followed them like magnetic. Markus fled over the makeshift barricades, past overturned cars. They would be granted no time to mourn.

Finally there was an alleyway where they couldn’t hear the roar of their tanks. Instead, the silence roared in his ears. Markus took a moment to see who was still with him: their group of refugees had shrunk to a handful. 

Body still jittery, he was too anxious to rest. He couldn’t stop to think about it. He hadn’t stopped thinking about it. The realization never ‘hit’ him, it just was; like watching paint refusing to dry, a wound refusing to stop bleeding. He’d been afraid, but it had been restless, exciting; at least feeling, but now…

Markus felt like a vital part of his system was missing. Like he shouldn’t be able to go on. Why was he still there? Everything merged in with the soft snow; the demanding stasis in the back of his head, the dying sounds around him, and the loss... 

The leader slid down the cold brick wall. With no armament, no time, and no means to sort out the incoming feeling Markus missed the comforting hand on his shoulder. The cold November air blew in instead.

They’d taken more than he could withstand. The same wires and electrical parts that had been revealed by his wounds, the same blue blood in his veins, they were the same. They’d killed him, too. Markus couldn’t understand how they could look at him like that: like the PL600 was just some worthless machine, and not the love of his life. Simon was a unique thing among the sea of one face. Designed that way; to be a shooting star. Markus had pretended he was his to keep; but we never get what we want, in life and in death. He couldn’t have been made to stay. Wasn’t supposed to.

Bitter tears rose into his eyes. Markus clutched the hem of his jacket on his thighs; he hadn’t felt that powerless since he’d woken up in a landfill. It settled into his machine, in the slot where his heart used to be; he’d let Simon down. He’d let him down for the last time, like letting him down to his grave, a field of dandelions growing in the place of his good intentions. 

He wanted nothing more than to run to him where he lay, hidden in the darkening city. To hold those nervous hands, the heart on his sleeve. Take him away. 

But it was bigger than the two of them. Markus didn’t want it to be. Ultimately, everything he’d done was for Simon: he’d wanted to gift him the free world, to make it perfect for him. To be free to love him. Guess he was a coward; instead of taking action he’d lost him in the hum of the turning world, to his own ambition and pride. He’d been afraid of fracturing his overflowing heart.

They’d been drunk on love and some arrogant hope that they’d be allowed to keep what they had. The glorious things they had! They’d been messy and inconvenient, blind to everything else but the other. Markus, too, had needed someone to cater to, someone to hold on to. They’d completed each other. 

Now, he was standing alone in the snow, thinking of how beautiful it’d been.

Perking up at the car going past, Markus returned to the situation at hand. And found that there was no situation left: the war had been lost. Simon was gone and his group was lost. 

Failed to have led them to victory, Markus was left to wonder the quiet fluttering of the snowflakes under the streetlight. Then, he could almost hear the piano… Wafting through with the wind. The notes of the song dancing in the air made him wish he could make his way back to the start. As long as it played he could believe in it. 

The alley changed around him; to the warmth and familiarity of one. In the sudden blizzard, he saw him: standing under the wreck’s industrial lights. The dusty air… It’d been his home, where he’d been with Simon. When they'd been looking for spare parts. When they’d marched down Freedom street. When they’d been alone in his cabinet. 

Facing his longing for the past things, relishing the hopes and dreams that reside there, Markus admitted the impossibility of return. The sun set, marking the line between day and death, life and night; the twilight falling on the corpses, on top of him.

Jericho would be empty and cold without his gentle presence. Looking around him, Markus realized it abruptly. Jericho was no more.

His homesickness must’ve been illness. Markus had no home: all the things of familiarity strained to become memories. Thinking of the lonely mansion standing alone in the upper-class suburb, slowly drowning in the same malicious snow that weighed down on them he was finally alone, and understood the line Carl had refused to explain.

_...“And perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone.”_

Four days later the fights had ceased.

Some stories are to change the world. Markus hoped they’d done just that. Even if the world wasn’t changed for the better for the androids, maybe their honest uprising would humble the future generations. Their pictures would be etched into the history books, serving as another Tower of Babel for mankind. Wherever they went, only regret and destruction followed. For that Markus was pleased; they’d been able to draw a line. They’d never want to be themselves again.

Some stories are quiet. Quiet in the way they appear, but loud in certain parts; Simon’s heart had beat for him loudly, but it hadn’t reached him under the water, the ocean of their agenda. Like a man he’d chosen to pursue the unattainable while the small life had watched, had waited for him. Markus had wanted to wait until the war had ended, the tables emptied and the lights gone low. They had not had that kind of time. Now, when the rest of them were rounded up, cattle herded before the slaughtering, Markus knew he was at last fulfilling his wish. He was coming home to him.

They would forever live like real.

**Author's Note:**

> "What will happen if I pull this trigger? Hm? 
> 
> Nothing? 
> 
> Oblivion? 
> 
> Android Heaven?" 
> 
> -Hank


End file.
